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NBA EASTERN CONFERENCE FINALS: CELTICS v MAGICMay 20, 2010Stan Van GundyBOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS: Practice Day Q. What sorts of things did you work on today in practice? STAN VAN GUNDY: Offense and defense. There you go. Yes, yes. Q. In particular? STAN VAN GUNDY: Well, we worked again -- obviously, we've worked on some things to try to get our ball movement better, understanding how they're playing us and what we have to do to get good shots. We worked on our transition offense and defense. Getting back has clearly been a problem for us. And then, defensively, we worked against some -- you know, just normal stuff against some of their sets with a couple of very minor adjustments we want to make. Q. How come getting back is such a problem? STAN VAN GUNDY: Well, they've done a good job of, number one, if you turn the ball over, they're gone. And number two, we've taken a lot of tough shots at the basket. And as I mentioned yesterday, we haven't finished them. Then you have our perimeter players under the rim, and it's tough to get back. They're out. So part of it comes down to better shot selection at this end, but also a better awareness, as somebody drives the ball, getting our other people to be rotating back quicker. We're standing around a little bit. Q. Where do you see the biggest improvement in Rondo over the last season? STAN VAN GUNDY: That's a tough question. I mean, obviously he's shooting the ball a little bit better. But I just think with him it hasn't necessarily been anything in particular. I think he's gotten more and more comfortable, and he just -- maybe this is the improvement -- he just seems to be unquestionably, when they're on the floor, the leader. I don't mean the leader that's in guys' face. But he's controlling things on the offensive end of the floor. You see him out there, he's positioning everybody, he's getting everybody set, and he's making a lot of the plays, you know, that create opportunities for the the other guys. I just think it's a confidence thing. He's continued to get better and better and better. He's an all-star now. He's an extremely confident guy who has obviously been in a lot of big games for a young guy. A championship, and he's been in a lot of playoff games. He's been in this situation. I think he feels in control of everything. And he's much more aggressive offensively. You know, he's not the guy who now is just looking to pass. He will take advantage of his scoring opportunities, and I think that's made him a lot more dangerous. It used to be you just really worried about him making passes to people. Now you've got to stop him, which all that does is even give him more passing angles. So his aggressiveness offensively, I think, has been another big, big area for him. Q. Did Matt Barnes practice? STAN VAN GUNDY: He was fine today. We did do contact and everything. He went the whole time. Q. Did everybody else practice? STAN VAN GUNDY: Everybody else also. Everybody went today. Q. (Indiscernible)? STAN VAN GUNDY: No, it didn't. He was on Ray Allen to begin the series. At halftime in the last game we changed that. As I said, that will go back and forth all the time. Q. Is there some thought about keeping J.J. on the floor more because the ball moves better; that when he gets going, it can really help you with the shooting? STAN VAN GUNDY: I think clearly that at least in these two games -- I mean, you can just look at it objectively, looking at the numbers when he's on the floor, there's no question we've been better. And I think a lot of it has to do with his energy offensively. He's on the move a lot. He's harder to guard. He creates opportunities for people. When it's he and Vince and one of the point guards all in there together, now you can really move the ball better, play more pick-and-roll basketball. Things like that. Q. Is the trade-off on the defensive end sometimes? STAN VAN GUNDY: I don't know. He's been pretty good defensively. They have tried to go at him in the post and probably will again. A lot of it depends on whether or not they're able to hurt us badly with that. We know that's what they'll do, is they'll throw him down there in the post. But we'll see what happens on that. Q. If you did something like that, and Matt would be the guy coming off the bench, do you lose something -- STAN VAN GUNDY: No, I wouldn't start that way. Look, we've played 100 games, now going back to the pre-season, and we've settled on our lineup. We're not going to change our starting lineup and start messing with guy's heads and things like that right now. Substitution rotations and things like that can change. I can guarantee you that, barring injury, for the rest of the time those are the five guys that are going to go out and start. We're not in panic mode here. Q. How would you characterize your players' response in practice the last two days? STAN VAN GUNDY: Yesterday all we did was watch film. Today we practiced. I thought our focus and concentration and our effort were all fantastic. I mean, I think our guys are anxious to try to improve some things and to get up to Boston and try to play one great game on Saturday night to get a victory on the road. That's our only focus right now. I think guys have been -- right from the get-go today, I think our minds were into it. And I mean into it to the point of the adjustments we talked about making were clearly on guy's minds in practice. End of FastScripts |
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